2017/09/08 by Eshel Faraggi, Faraggi, Eshel
Agricultural and Biological Sciences · Engineering · Medicine · Physics and Astronomy · #Biofield Effects and Biophysics #Biological Physics (physics.bio-ph) #FOS: Physical sciences #Microfluidic and Bio-sensing Technologies #Plant and Biological Electrophysiology Studies #physics.bio-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1709.02745
4 pages, 2 figures, revolutionary
arxiv created 2017/09/08 · openalex publication_date 2017/09/08 · arxiv updated 2017/09/11 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Experiments were performed to test the effect of an electric field on growing E-coli cultures. Cell growing dishes were fitted with platinum wires to create a potential drop across the dish. Water diluted E-coli cultures were brushed across the dish in various patterns and the growth of E-coli colonies was recorded. Repeated experiments on this model were performed. It was found that E-coli grew preferentially in the vicinity of the lower electric potential, a region characterized by the presence of positive ions while there was a clear non-growth area near the higher potential, a region characterized by the presence of negative ions. These results support previous theoretical analysis of the general problem of cell division which accounts for the symmetry of this system, and in which electrostatic repulsion is the primary long range driving force of the dividing biological cell.